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Published: April 27th 2007
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I spent a few days in Alice Springs just chilling out before my next tour. That city is pretty dodgy, one of those places that you wonder why people still live there. If you are female it is “strongly” advised not to walk alone after dark, heck even guys shouldn’t. That is where I spent Easter. Most of the girls that were on my Outback tour were also kicking around for a few days so we all went out for dinner on Easter Monday. Well we actually all went out for dinner everyday and breakfast. Kate (UK) was on the next tour with me to Darwin and Kakadu and I sure glad she was. Our expectations were really high for this tour after coming out of the Outback; we had a great time, we sure missed our bush camping, swag sleeping, and our mates.
We left for Darwin on a Tuesday morning. A very early pick-up, 5:45 am. However the dude didn’t show up till around 6:15. The travel agent that sold us the trip told us max. 24 people and we would be traveling by small bus. Small bus with air con and a comfy seat might be
a welcome change. Well we were on a small bus but they had two of them so really we were 48. A little disappointing because it is harder to gel with people when we are that big, our guide didn’t put much effort in getting us to mingle with each other either. He was pretty lame and he appeared to want to be anywhere else but driving us around. I think it was his last trip and then he had a month vacation coming, I suppose I can relate, not that I would ever slack at work before a vacation. Off we go.
On our first day we stopped in at Devils Marbles. They were pretty cool. They are made of granite and it is believed they were formed about 1.7 billion years ago. It really looks like someone was playing marbles. I was more impressed with them than Ayers Rock. We also stopped in Wycliffe, UFO Capital of Australia. More UFO sightings happen in this area then any other in Australia. I wonder if the cheap booze in this neck of the woods has something to do with it? We spent the night at Banka Banka an Outback
Cattle Station. We slept in permanent tents; all I wanted was a swag and the open air, I think mainly because they never clean the tents and there were lots of spiders in them!
Banka Banka was the first operational pastoral lease in the area and is over 11,600 sq kms, has 65,000 head of cattle and only 25 people are employed there. They muster up the cattle by helicopter and then by horse. When they need to sell cattle or transport them somewhere else they use huge cattle liners which they call Road Trains. Road Trains are about 50 meters long and can weigh up to 200 tones!
The next day we stopped in at Mataranka to have a swim in the hot springs. The temperature was 34 degrees. Not as warm as the Dalhousie springs but that was alright considering it was still cooler then the temperature of the air. We camped for the night near Katherine Gorge. Again we stayed in permanently erected tents; however the bathrooms were pretty exciting. Besides all the bugs that were flying in there because they were attracted to the light, we saw a huge Huntsman Spider on the wall,
the biggest one I have seen yet, and there were green frogs living in the toilets! In the morning if you wanted a shower you had to kick the large bull frogs out before stepping in.
That morning we spent it at Katherine Gorge. It was beautiful. We did a 5 km hike into one of the pools that you can swim in, splashed around, then hike 5 km back out. The air temperature was very high and now we are in 95% humidity. You were sweating buckets just after 10 steps. It made the dip in the pool really refreshing. That afternoon we drove to Darwin. It was so hot and humid, you wanted to be inside in air conditioning al the time.
This tour was split into two sections, the next day we headed out with a smaller group into Litchfield and Kakadu National Parks, entering into Croc Territory. Again it was an early start. This time there were only 16 of us. There were only 3 people on this tour that I didn’t recognize from the previous one.
The first day we drove to Litchfield where we stopped to view the Cathedral Termite Mounds.
They are huge and rock solid, like cement; they are fire and water proof. Rumour has it if you have a body to hide stuff it in a termite mound and it will be gone in a day. (Need to hide someone? Drop me a line.) After that we swam at Buley Rockhole which was a series of waterfall pools and you could sit right in the waterfalls, a nice massage. Our next destination was Florence Falls. We stopped for a hot dog lunch and then got to go on a “Jumping Croc” cruise.
The cruise was on Adelaide River, which is full of crocodiles. What they do is hang some raw meat over the edge; a croc sees it and comes to check it out, then jumps for the meat. I can’t believe the power in their tails. They push themselves up out of the water with just their tail, body coming right up out of the water. We learned that the crocodiles are pretty much everywhere in the area so swimming is not advised in any swimhole. I also got to hold a Python or rather have it wrap itself around me. I held Olly - a
fitting name for the Olive Python. She was so soft and very content hanging around my shoulders. If you stroked her underside, you could feel her constrict, a little nerve racking considering they are a constrictor snake and that is how they kill their prey. I think she like me though as she didn’t try to strangle me.
Day 2 we visited Ubirr to view some Aboriginal Art that was painted on the cliffs. We learned about how they used these paintings to teach the young about morals, hunting and the way of life. Our last day we spent swimming at a couple of different swimholes. One even had a sign “Crocodiles have been known to move through this area undetected.” Once at the swim hole there were other people already swimming so we figured they haven’t been chewed yet must be safe. “Look out below: CANONBALL!!!!” My technique was not so great; I smacked hard and had a red ass after that one. Everyone laughed and I could see the snicker in Red Ass’s eyes. That afternoon we drove back to Darwin.
That ended my tour from Alice Springs to Darwin. It was a heck of a
lot of driving. Alice to Darwin was about 3,000 kms and the Litchfield Kakadu trip was another 1500 km of driving. Sick of being in a vehicle, but that didn’t stop me from my next big adventure, driving across the Nullabor to Perth!
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Christina
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Termite Mound
Hmm I remember another comment about getting rid of a body ;-) hehee Sounds like you are having a blast. How big was that spider? It's hard to tell from the picture. Take care, love yah lots. Christina :-)